Director : JOSEPH GAï RAMAKA

Genre : FICTION SHORT

SUPPORTED BY OSIWA

STATUS : POST-PRODUCTION

Synopsis (EN)

On the beach at Gorée, director Arma Gòo supervises the provisioning of his boat, the "Kumba Kastel", and embarks his troupe of the island's best storytellers, dancers, singers and actors.

He wants to go to the Cinecittà studios in Europe to shoot a musical fresco.

The Kumba Kastel is built on two levels. Its bowels, where the women-tam- bours turn the turbine, and the deck, where Arma Gòo and its acrobats set up shop.

In a constant back-and-forth between these two worlds, a succession of stories, sung or danced, multiply.

During the voyage, the ship crosses the path of a drifting boat. On it, "bodies in search of Elsewhere" echo the suffering of migration.

They are welcomed aboard the Kumba Kastel.

After a wild night, the Kumba Kastel nears the coast of the Far North.

In the fog, a coastguard advances, menacing. The voyage takes a tragic turn.

Director’s Bio

Joseph Gaï Ramaka is a Senegalese filmmaker. In 1997, he directed the shor t film Ainsi soit-il, which won him the Silver Lion at the 54th Venice International Film Festival. His first feature film Karmen Geï was selected to screen at the 54th Cannes Film Festival (Director’s Forthnight) in May 2001, at the Sundance Film Festival and at the 2002 Pan African Film & Arts Festival Awards in Los Angeles. His second feature film, Et si Latif avait raison! won the Best Documentary Film Award at the 2006 Vues d’Afrique Festival in Montreal. In 2009, with It’s my man! he made his first love story documentary, filmed in the USA. He created the New Orleans Afrikan Film Festival. In 2013, he created Goree Island Cinema, a space for encounters and cinematic creations, which since 2015 has been home to the Gorée Cinema Festival.